Syria and Turkey have always had fraught and turbulent relations due, in part, to the problems emanating from long and unmarked border. This seems to be changing recently, however.  

Days ago, it was announced that heads of the Turkish and Syrian national intelligence services, Hakan Fidan and Ali Mamlouk, had a meeting remarkably in Damascus early in September.

Syria, being a successor state to the defunct Ottoman Empire which was dissolved in the aftermath of the World War I, and consequently sharing nearly 911km of a porous border, has always had turbulent relations with Turkey.

In the Middle East, allied-enemy alliances are not founded on solid grounds and remain open to changes. Categorically, the Syrian conflict shows clearly how there are no permanent friends nor permanent enemies.

In retrospect, Syrian- Turkish relations in a decade could be divided into typically two different phases; regime change and the securitization of  its southern border.

For the first six months of the Syrian crisis, Turkey urged Syrian President Bashar Assad to deliver reforms to his country.

Serving that end, Turkish intelligence men and officials went regularly to Damascus offering advice to Assad. However, as the country was delving into endless violence, it was clear that Assad was not listening.

In August 2011 the U.S. President Barak Obama became the first ever foreign leader to call on Assad to step down due to the violent crackdown on Syrian opposition.

Days later, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan followed suit. Turkey's policy towards Syria changed dramatically. Turkey's main objective and priority in Syria was the realization of the regime change.

Turkey became a key player in the war that was ravaging Syria. Further, it went on the offensive hosting several meetings of the Syrian opposition and giving harbor to defecting Syrian politicians and military personnel setting up the Free Syrian Army (FSA) whose fighters were trained by Turkish officers.

Due to the position undertaken by Turkey in militarily and logistically supporting the Syrian opposition, its relations with Syria deteriorated irrevocably. Suddenly, Kurds in the north were given free rein.

When Syria's military and security forces withdrew from most of the Kurdish predominant areas in July 2012, to fight the FSA elsewhere, well-trained Kurdish fighters took charge.

Mistakenly, Erdogan seems to have anticipated Assad would fall in a few months period. Turkey's prediction of a rapid downfall of the Syrian regime did come to fruition, however. The Syrian regime was already fully experienced in dealing with dissident movements.

The partial withdrawal of Syrian security forces from northern Syria allowed the Kurds to become the main political actor in Jazira, Kobane and Afrin (Rojava).

Mistakenly too, Erdogan trailed behind the U.S. to the eleven hour. Though the Obama administration repeatedly said "Assad must go", however, that did not go beyond pro forma demarches. Obama's "Assad Must Go" seemed to be not state policy rather; a personal preference.

The U.S. call on Assad to leave power remained the main friction point between the U.S. and Russia, the main backer of the Syrian regime.

Russian support was lifesaving for Syria first diplomatically in the United Nations Security Council via the vetoes it raised and then militarily in the repressive crackdown against the opposition forces on the ground.

Conversely, the U.S. policy in Syria since 2015 shifted primarily to the defeat of the Islamic State (ISIS) which brought to the fore the Kurdish forces of Peoples' Protection Units (YPG).  The Kurds garnered worldwide attention and support.

Ankara says the YPG is the Syrian extension of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). Feeling the implied dangers, Erdogan changed his Syria’s rules of engagement.

The Russian intervention in Syria late in September 2015 tilted gradually the balance of power to the favor of Assad and eventually destroyed Erdogan's anti- Assad designs.

Russia's support was instrumental for Assad to survive the conflict against opposition groups backed in part by Turkey. This, among others, pushed Erdogan to revise his Syrian policy proper.

By 2016 the basic parameters of Turkey’s Syrian policy had shifted from regime change to the securitization of its southern borders. Ever since the top priority of Turkey in Syria was/is to prevent the formation of a Kurdish state.

In August 2016 Turkish armed forces crossed into Jarablus in far- east Aleppo commencing "Operation Euphrates Shield." Turkey’s incursion(s) into Syria brought Ankara into hostility with Damascus and seemingly aroused tensions with Moscow.

Syria has always accused Ankara of harboring and supporting terrorist groups. Turkey, however, maintains its Syrian operation(s) are in accordance with its right to self-defense as outlined in Article 51 of the United Nations Charter.

To all appearances, Ankara succeeded in distancing fighters of the Islamic State (ISIS) from its southern border. Cunningly strategically however, Ankara embarked upon territorially disconnecting the already non-contiguous Kurdish cantons of Rojava.

Notably, the Turkish operation in Jarablus came nearly 40 days after the bloody July 15 th attempted coup, in which Russia's full- throated and unconditional support to Erdogan in dire contrast to the Nato allies in the West was a breath of life.

Afterwards a remarkable transition was made in 2016 when Russian President Vladimir Putin successfully engaged Erdogan in the Astana format.

The evacuation in December 2016 by the Syrian opposition from east Aleppo was the culmination of the Russian-Turkish cooperation in Syria. Notably, it was Erdogan that brokered Aleppo's ceasefire deal and the evacuation agreement. It marked a new era of Ankara's policy towards Syria.

The fall of Aleppo to the regime forces was the biggest ever blow to the opposition the one-time staunchly supported by Erdogan. Since Aleppo was re-taken in December 2016, Assad has always maintained that "state control would fully return to the whole of Syria."

Syria being top on the agenda, Russia and Turkey were said to have agreed to fight the Kurdish forces in a full political, military and security Moscow meeting in December 2018.

The change of heart for Erdogan came on August 5, following a meeting with Putin in Sochi. After three months of threats to carry out a new military incursion into Tal Rifaat in north Aleppo and Manbij to the east, Erdogan strikingly and to the astonishment of the Syrian opposition, said he was to cooperate with the Syrian regime.

Economically, Syria is a vital economic artery for Turkish goods to cross into Jordan and to the gulf states eventually. Turkey, in turn, could help Syria evade, though partially, the U.S. imposed sanctions (Caesar Act).

For Turkey, after repairing ties with Egypt and the United Arab Emirates following long years of apathy and estrangement, Damascus- Turkey’s gate to the Arab world, both economically and politically too- could be the next.

Idlib and Rojava are inseparably interrelated. The former is strategically important to Turkey where it maintains several observation posts, while the latter- home to oil resources, among others- is important for the Syrian regime to thrive economically at least.

For the first time in a decade, Damascus and Ankara seem more ever determined to converge. With many diverging points (Idlib) already existing, both countries share a common desire to dismantle the SDF (Rojava). Each for different respective purposes, however.
 

BY: Lazghine Ya'qoube